Gail Alexan­der

The cri­sis con­cern­ing the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion and oth­er high lev­els will af­fect T&T’s in­vest­ment cli­mate since for­eign in­vestors won’t be at­tract­ed if they lack con­fi­dence in T&T’s in­sti­tu­tions or think there’s a po­lit­i­cal con­spir­a­cy to ap­point a “pup­pet” Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice.

That was the view of UNC Sen­a­tor Wade Mark, de­liv­er­ing his Bud­get 2022 state­ment in the Sen­ate yes­ter­day.

Mark dis­missed the Bud­get as a “weaponised” mech­a­nism meant to in­flict max­i­mum in­jury on the peo­ple “while (PNM) si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly en­rich­es them­selves, their fam­i­ly, and their fi­nanciers.”

He added, “In this bud­get de­bate, our coun­try is en­dur­ing a con­sti­tu­tion­al calami­ty that will have un­told rip­pling ef­fects through­out every sec­tor of our so­ci­ety, in­clud­ing our econ­o­my, there is no greater sin­gle im­ped­i­ment to eco­nom­ic pros­per­i­ty than the ero­sion of the rule of law. And there’s been no greater threat to the rule of law than this gov­ern­ment.”

“This coun­try’s chief law­mak­er, whose in­com­pe­tence is the sole cause for this calami­ty which has be­fall­en T&T could ap­pre­ci­ate the grav­i­ty and se­ri­ous­ness of his hubris.“

"There is no greater risk to eco­nom­ic pros­per­i­ty than the ero­sion of the rule of law."

Mark said T&T’s econ­o­my de­pends heav­i­ly on for­eign di­rect in­vest­ment. “Which for­eign in­vestor wants to in­ject cap­i­tal in­to a coun­try that can’t even se­lect a com­mis­sion­er of po­lice? In oth­er places com­pa­nies are tak­ing per­sons to the edge of the Earth’s at­mos­phere, mean­while, in T&T, a mer­it list from the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion can’t even trav­el from the Pres­i­dent’s house to the Par­lia­ment."

“Which for­eign in­vestor wants to in­vest mon­ey in a coun­try where the chief law­mak­er can­not draft the sim­plest of doc­u­ments, much less be­ing able to draft the com­plex fi­nan­cial and reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work that for­eign in­vestors re­quire to en­sure pro­tec­tion on in­vest­ment?“

Mark added, “Which for­eign in­vestor wants to in­vest in a coun­try where that same in­com­pe­tent law drafter us­es Par­lia­ment to make un­true ac­cu­sa­tions against a sit­ting op­po­si­tion leader and then is forced to prompt­ly apol­o­gize?"

"We have no Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice, no Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion, an At­tor­ney Gen­er­al’s of­fice is with­out com­pe­tent lead­er­ship, we have an un­known pub­lic of­fi­cial that is a pup­pet mas­ter ma­nip­u­lat­ing con­sti­tu­tion­al process­es- and we have a Pres­i­dent who I will not men­tion be­cause the stand­ing or­ders do not per­mit me to im­peach that of­fi­cer.’’

Mark added, “Our eco­nom­ic prob­lems don’t ex­ist in iso­la­tion. If in­vestors and cit­i­zens have no con­fi­dence in our in­sti­tu­tions, then they will have no con­fi­dence in our econ­o­my.“

“If in­vestors think there’s a po­lit­i­cal con­spir­a­cy to ap­point a pup­pet CoP com­mis­sion­er then they will not in­vest for fear of po­lit­i­cal pros­e­cu­tion. If in­vestors aren’t con­vinced this Gov­ern­ment has the po­lit­i­cal strength and will to re­move the ob­vi­ous source of in­com­pe­tence from their ranks, they will not in­vest."

Mark said Gov­ern­ment should in­tro­duce a tax on the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al,

"For every time he los­es a case. We wouldn’t have to wor­ry about prop­er­ty tax af­ter that. With that mon­ey we could buy every­body in the coun­try a Porsche.”

Mark called for a foren­sic au­dit of the FCB/ Bari­ta In­vest­ments is­sue and for the FCB CEO and Board to re­sign over this “Ponzi scheme”.